


Deck the pets

by aftereighteen



Category: Swimming RPF
Genre: Holidays, M/M, Pets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-01
Updated: 2013-01-01
Packaged: 2017-11-23 07:00:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/619358
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aftereighteen/pseuds/aftereighteen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ryan talks Michael into a Lochte-Phelps Christmas card</p>
            </blockquote>





	Deck the pets

**Author's Note:**

> This fits in with the same verse as some of my others ("Arrivals" and "The Appliance of Science") but should work as a standalone too. And is slightly festively late. It was originally posted in two parts on LJ, but the second followed directly so I've combined them.
> 
> It was inspired by my own appreciation for festive animal clothing.

Mike takes a deep breath as he puts his key in the lock. He can tell from the state of the front yard that Ryan’s annual festive bedazzling campaign has begun during his brief trip away and he wishes he’d had more than a thirty second warning about this.

Before he enters the house, Mike gives himself a shake, turns and surveys the lights strewn across the lawn. He thinks for a moment that he might cry – because this is a sign that Ryan just might be back on track, back to his usual self after months of grieving and blaming himself for the stillbirth. But he doesn’t want to get ahead of himself. So he takes a deep breath and enters the house.

He’s soon greeted by an unimpressed Herman waddling over. Sporting a pair of antlers.

Mike realises he needn’t have worried about going away, shouldn’t have been concerned about leaving Ryan to do some meetings and appearances in New York. Didn’t have to bother condensing what should’ve been a six day trip into two. Because if Ryan was up to putting the dogs in ridiculous outfits, he had well and truly rediscovered his Lochte-normal. Which means that Mike can shout at him about this.

“Ryan!” he bellows, scooping Herman up and removing the antlers.

“Jeah, what?” he gets in response. Followed by a loud crash and a, “Fuck, you’re back!” Mike rolls his eyes, wondering why he bothered printing his schedule out and sticking it to the fridge.

He starts heading through the house towards the noise and is met by a grinning Ryan, who may or may not have glitter on his nose and in his hair, but who definitely pulls him into a strong hug and murmurs, “Missed you,” into his neck in the process.

Michael pulls away with a scowl and holds Herman up in between them, “Yeah, I think Herm did too. What’ve you been up to?”

“Oh, y’know,” Ryan says with a casual wave of his hand, “just getting the house ready for Christmas.”

Michael looks around and suddenly sees the full extent of Ryan’s creativity. The entire room is sparkling – Michael hopes Ryan’s not touched the bedroom, because he would like to get some sleep during the next month – and there isn’t a surface that doesn’t contain some sort of ornament. As he’s gaping at his surroundings, Carter and Stella clatter through to join them and Michael’s jaw drops.

Somehow, Ryan has wrestled the two dogs into sweaters. Festive sweaters. Depression or not, this is where Michael draws the line. He yanks the antlers off of Herman before setting him back down, and calls Stella over, trying to remove her from her knitted prison.

“Hey, what’re you doing?” Ryan asks indignantly. “It took me fuckin’ ages to get that on her. And she hurt me.” He holds his finger out for inspection. Michael just swats it away and continues trying to free Stella’s legs, which isn’t working out so well given that she seems to think they’re playing some sort of game.

“Did you attack Sydney too?” he asks.

“I resent the use of the word ‘attack’...” Ryan pouts, hands on hips. Right on cue, Michael’s cat appears and mercifully seems to have gotten off lightly, modelling only an extravagantly festive collar.

Michael crouches down and removes Sydney’s collar. Ryan watches, whining, “Dude, seriously, are you gonna undo everything I’ve done? Because it kinda took me ages.”

Mike rubs Sydney’s head before standing back up. “Ryan. There’s a limit. It’s taken me years to get used to all of this. I’m confident that no amount of years will make dog sweaters ok. Especially not in Florida.”

Ryan puts his hands on his hips and pouts. “Shoulda known you’d get all Grinch on my ass.”

Michael raises an eyebrow. “Thanksgiving was only last weekend.” Almost as soon as the words are out of his mouth, he knows he’s crossed the line. He wants to sweep Ryan into his arms, kiss his hair and apologise immediately, but it’s already too late. Ryan’s face has gone from playful to wounded, and the shutters – the ones which terrify Michael, because no way should there be anything in the world capable of emotionally shutting Ryan Lochte down – have fallen again.

Ryan crouches, pulls a doggy treat from his pocket and pacifies Stella with it whilst he deftly undresses her. He mutters to himself as he does so, “I just wanted to surprise you...Christmas card...thought it’d be nice...missed you.”

Once he’s done wrestling with the dog, he stands back up, sweater in hand and pushes past Michael, disappearing upstairs. Michael rubs his face and looks down at the dogs who, unimpressed as they had looked with their seasonal attire, were definitely judging him for walking in the door and bringing Ryan’s mood right down.

“I know, bad husband,” he sighs at them. “But you guys know how hard this is, him being like this.” He half expects them to nod, because he knows the animals – especially Carter – understand. They don’t, of course, they just blink up at him.

Michael gathers his thoughts and formulates a plan of action, which begins with ushering Carter up the stairs and into their bedroom. Michael doesn’t follow the dog, just closes the door quietly and leaves Ryan alone. There have been a few days when Ryan has retreated like this, and Michael has learned that it’s best to let him be for a little while.

*

Several hours later, Ryan appears in the kitchen, rubbing his eyes groggily and asking when their moms showed up.

“Don’t worry, they haven’t,” Michael tells him, glancing up from chopping vegetables. “As far as I know, they’re both at a safe distance away in their own homes.”

Ryan perches on a stool at the kitchen island and watches Michael continue his task. “So how come there’s food clearly being cooked but it doesn’t smell like burning?”

“I’m making dinner,” Michael tells him.

Ryan makes a show of leaning down to look under his stool, checking what Michael’s hiding. “Where’s the chef?”

“Dude, if you’d rather not risk my cooking...” Michael replies nonchalantly. “But if you’re gonna do that, I’ll warn you now that you’re also gonna have a very fat husband.”

“How come?” Ryan asks, sitting back up and resting his elbow on the counter, dropping his chin into his hand.

“Well, I kinda made this giant pasta dish and there’s more than enough for two...”

Ryan sniffs the air again. “Okay, I’ll risk it,” he decides. “Want me to do anything?”

“Just go and sit yourself down at the table,” Michael tells him. “It’s almost ready, I’ll bring it through.”

Ryan does as he’s told, settling himself down and managing to remember not to touch the dogs on his way. Michael appears at his side and serves up the food before sitting down across the table from Ryan.

He waits for Ryan to take a bite before clearing his throat. “I’m sorry, Doggy,” he says earnestly. Ryan pauses, fork halfway to his mouth for his second bite. “I know you were trying to cheer things up and get excited and be yourself.”

Ryan swallows and tries to cut in, “It’s oka...”

“No it’s not,” Michael says firmly, reaching across the table and taking Ryan’s free hand. “I love you, and that includes how happy doing all of this,” he gestures around at the abundance of tinsel and fake holly garlands, “makes you. It makes me happy too. And that’s all I want, for us both to be happy.”

He squeezes Ryan’s hand to emphasise his point and smiles slightly. He’s relieved when Ryan squeezes back, even though it doesn’t raise a smile. “Thanks,” he mumbles instead and continues eating.

A few bites later, Ryan speaks up. “So...have you thought about my idea?”

“About what?”

Ryan looks up at him pointedly, then looks over at the dogs, who are lolling around together in front of the TV.

Michael bites his tongue hard and makes a quick assessment of Ryan, deciding whether to stand his ground, give in or go for the married couples’ option: compromise. Although he’d dearly love to kick Ryan into touch and stand by his “dogs should not wear human clothes” sentiment, he knows that they both pick their battles carefully now.

“Yes,” he says slowly.

Ryan looks round at him quickly, shocked at first, but getting his game face on the minute he spots Michael’s. “What are your terms?” the older man asks.

Michael’s about to get indignant, but Ryan raises an eyebrow. “Dude. I’m your husband, I know your body and I know that look. It’s your ‘I’m not giving in, if you’re getting something, I am too’ face. So, what’s it to be? Cooking for a month? Laundry for a fortnight? Blow jobs on demand – no matter where or when – for a week? Not that you don’t get that anyway, but I do _try_ to keep a lid on it in public...”

Michael snorts at that. “You don’t try at all.”

Ryan rolls his eyes and picks up his fork, pointing at Michael with it. “Okay, so that was a lie, but don’t try and tell me you don’t love it after not being able to hold my hand or kiss me in public for years.” He’s got Michael there and he knows it. “I’m waiting,” Ryan mumbles around a mouthful of food.

“Cooking for a month,” Michael counts off on his fingers. “You do the laundry anyway, you can't use that. So the blow jobs had better be a three week stretch to compensate.” Ryan chokes on his food indignantly. Michael snorts, “Yeah, get used to that.”

Ryan scowls. Michael puts his hand up, “I’m still naming my terms, you can cut in and try to bargain me down when I’m done.”

Ryan shovels another load of food in his mouth, indicating that he’ll reluctantly wait. “And no more Christmas ornament purchases...”

Ryan’s fork clatters to the plate and Michael thinks there might be steam coming out of his ears. “...until we get the result we want.” Michael knows this is a bold move and he’s mentally crossed every appendage for luck – something that he doesn’t normally rely on, because Michael believes in hard work, not luck.

Ryan swallows his food and considers Michael’s offer for a couple of minutes. “I...no more sparkly stuff?”

Michael nods. “But I don’t know why you’re worried. It only means waiting six weeks.”

“That wasn’t my point,” Ryan counters. “You can’t be sure of that.”

“Yes I can,” Michael replies quickly. “The test results come back then and...”

“Don’t, Mike,” Ryan says quietly, looking down at his plate again. “We made a pact. No talking about this stuff.”

Michael reaches over and takes Ryan’s hand again. “I know,” he says quietly. “I know we did. But do you wanna know why I’m putting this into the deal?”

“Not really,” Ryan mumbles without looking up.

Michael ploughs on anyway. “Because I’m confident. This time it’ll happen. Because like I said, I want us to be happy. And I know this’ll make you happy so I’m not stopping until we get there. I don’t care what it takes.”

Ryan looks up at him and his eyes are shining. “You can’t say that. Six years without a day off isn’t what’ll fix this, Mike.”

Michael stays quiet, allows Ryan this moment, despite his protestation that they promised not to talk about it. Ryan carries on, saying more than he has for months, finally letting it out and, without saying the words, expressing all of his hurt and anger and pain. It’s horrible to watch, and Michael realises that the dogs have gone quiet and that one by one, they’re slinking over to Ryan’s side.

When Ryan trails off, Michael waits a beat before speaking again. “I’m not asking you to go six years without a day off,” he clarifies. “I’m asking you to come with me and take this one race at a time. I’ll be there, we’re doing this together, just like always. And when it all works out, you can buy as much sparkly crap and as many dog sweaters and antler sets and fucking...leather armchair diamond-encrusted dog couches as you like, okay? Because I know that makes you happy and I know that being a dad will too.”

Ryan considers this before slowly nodding. Mike squeezes his hand again and waits. “Okay, deal,” Ryan says quietly.

“Good,” Michael replies, letting out a breath. “Because I know exactly when I’m calling in the first blow job.”

Ryan leans back with a groan. “Dude, you know I’m normally all over that, but we just ate,” Ryan rubs his belly for emphasis, but Michael knows it’s genuine. He hides his smile, letting Ryan bitch a little longer. “I don’t even wanna move, nevermind suck your dick. Can you wait, like, a half hour at least?”

“Well, I actually wanted you to go and pick out an outfit for the Christmas card photoshoot, but if you don’t want to go through the clothes I bought this afternoon then I guess it can wait...” he teases.

Ryan’s suddenly bolt upright in his chair again, but is soon frowning suspiciously. “You bought clothes? If there’s any Ravens gear in there, I swear to God, Mike...”

Michael smiles mischievously. “Go and see for yourself. Bags are in your closet.”

He gets up, gathering their plates and walking into the kitchen. As he starts to stack the dishwasher, Michael hears Ryan thunder up the stairs, closely followed by his loyal companions. 

Once he’s tidied up, Michael follows Ryan to the walk-in. He leans against the door frame as Ryan wriggles into a festive sweater, admiring the ripple of abs as his husband finds his way through the knitwear.

“I knew that one would look good,” he smiles appreciatively. Ryan turns to look at him and glances down at the sweater.

“You think?” he asks, fishing for compliments.

Michael nods immediately. “Great cut on you.” He steps forward, dodging the dogs on the floor and picks one up that Ryan has discarded. Mike sheds his t-shirt, making a deliberate show of stretching out his arms, knowing full well that Ryan is watching him like a hawk, and slides into his own sweater. It completely clashes with Ryan’s, but the older man just grins.

“Perfect,” he laughs. “People are gonna need sunglasses to look at this card!”

Michael smiles and leans over to press his lips to Ryan’s, slowly curling a hand around to cradle his head. “Maybe we’ll start something new?”

Ryan snorts. “More likely we’ll end up on some website about embarrassing outfits. But at least we’ll look good in our own way.” He leans in and kisses Mike, pressing him up against the jewellery cabinet with his hips. “But can we shoot tomorrow? I kinda want to take some shots outside when it’s light...”

Michael nods his agreement, unable to speak with Ryan crowding his space and grinding their hips together. He hopes he’s guessed right with where this might be heading.

“Is the right answer,” Ryan murmurs, pressing their sweater-clad chests together and sliding his hands down to Mike’s hips. He kisses him again, shuffling Michael’s jeans and underwear off as he does so. 

“This can stay on,” he decides, rubbing his hand over Michael’s bicep before dropping to his knees and making good on his part of the deal.

*

Michael wakes up to something lapping at his face. He assumes it’s a dog – as gross as Ryan can be, licking Michael’s jaw is not something he does – but isn’t sure why said dog’s tongue is cold. Or why it smells clean. Clean like...

He shoots bolt upright in bed, knocking Ryan and a bowl of water halfway across the room in a swearing heap.

“What the fuck, Ryan?” he croaks, voice still asleep despite his body now being very much awake.

From his damp puddle on the floor by the dresser, Ryan picks himself up and tries to look threatening. “I am not,” he insists, “sending a picture of you looking like some sorta caveman round to everyone we know as a Christmas wish. Because that’d be more like a Christmas nightmare. It’s bad enough that you make me and the dogs put up with it, it isn’t something you put the ones you love through, Mike.”

“So you decide to attack me in my sleep?” Mike clears his throat, managing to raise his voice. “What’s wrong with waiting until I’m, like, conscious to talk about it?”

Ryan rolls his eyes. “Because you won’t talk about it. You won’t entertain the idea of even trimming it. Your suggestion would probably be to tame it into a hideous pornstache just to get back at me.”

Michael considers this for a minute and Ryan can see the way the cogs are turning in his head and he steps in. “Don’t even, dude. I can withdraw conjugal rights and, if that doesn’t work, divorce is A Thing and I can fucking do it, just you try me.”

Michael snorts. “Oh, I can see what _People_ would have to say about that already,” he counters. “After everything that happened around the wedding, they’d have a field day over our divorce: ‘Olympic swimmer divorces former-Olympic swimmer over facial hair’. Is that what you’ll cite in the papers, Ryan?”

“No judge in the land would turn that shit down,” Ryan tells him, hands on hips. “Alls I’d have to do would be to hand them a picture and they’d probably even laugh and ask why the hell I married you in the first place and fucking annul us straight away, nevermind divorce. So fuck you and your furry face. I just want us to look like two humans and three dogs, rather than three dogs, a hot stud-muffin and a grizzly bear.”

Michael’s about to pull a smart retort out of somewhere but his brain stops him. He’s hit by a flashback from the previous day – returning home to a happy Ryan who he managed to mortally wound within five minutes of getting back from his trip away – and he bites his tongue.

Instead, Michael gets out of bed, strides across the room and pulls Ryan into his arms. Rather than going for a kiss, he rubs his foamy face all over Ryan’s and murmurs straight in his ear, “For that little stunt, the beard stays.”

Ryan wriggles in his grip, trying to pull away. “Dude, you’re messing me up, so not cool, I’ve showered already.”

Michael pulls away and regards Ryan with a mischievous look. “Oh well that’s a shame. Because I was gonna trim my beard when I shower, but if you don’t want to come in and supervise...”

He smiles, still amazed at how Ryan’s clothes miraculously hit the floor every time he says something like that. Ryan grabs his hand and drags him into the bathroom, turning the shower up as hot as it’ll go.

*

Michael stopped counting the number of photo shoots he’s participated in years ago. But he knows that this is the first and last one he’ll do involving dogs. What’s confusing him the most is that he knows that Ryan has done this before, must know how much of a nightmare this was guaranteed to be, but he still wanted to do it.

Ryan wanted it badly enough that as soon as Michael agreed, he’d managed to arrange a photographer, hairdresser, makeup artist and a fucking dog groomer to come to their house and shoot their Christmas card the next day. Michael’s choosing to ignore the voice in his head telling him that Ryan may well have had this set up anyway and focuses instead on trying to control Stella.

This isn’t easy when the makeup lady flits in after every frame to dust his face – Ryan’s reminded him at least six times to buy a sweater made of natural fibres next time, to which Michael had responded that sweaters aren’t meant to be worn outdoors in Florida.

It doesn’t help that Ryan, as usual, is making the shoot look like a total breeze. Carter’s behaving immaculately – probably because he likes the attention just as much as his master – and is even looking adorable in front of the lens. Herman’s being typically placid, but the excitement is far too much for Stella. Ryan eventually senses Mike’s distress and takes pity on him, encouraging Carter to calm Stella down and making them sit nicely together.

As the hairdresser tweaks at Michael’s scalp, Ryan chats idly with the photographer about the next shot, making some suggestions about perhaps shooting the dogs alone and knitting them together with their owners in the edit suite later. He then changes all three dogs into different sweaters and adjusts Herman’s antlers as he waits for the preening to finish.

When the hairdresser and makeup artist declare Michael good to go, Ryan steps back onto the set, loops an arm around his husband and helps him to adopt an easy pose. Mike glances down and notices that Ryan’s got his left hand very pointedly on his hip, attempting to blind the hair and makeup ladies with the bling on his finger as it catches the lights.

“Doggy,” Mike mutters between shots. “I think it’s pretty fucking obvious that I’m not interested in them. You really think there’s something to worry about? Plus I’m sure one of them’s like my mom’s age.”

Ryan tilts Mike’s face toward him and pulls him in for a showy kiss. “Not anymore,” he grins when he finally lets go, resuming his previous pose.

*

A few hours later – things had gotten completely out of hand when Ryan had insisted on some shots of them all actually in the pool wearing sweaters – the dogs and Michael are out of their sweaters and the torture is over. Mike’s collapsed on the couch, nursing his second beer having necked the first and repeatedly told Ryan that he’s never doing this again.

Ryan sees the last of the crew out and flops down on the other end of the couch, scrolling through his phone to review the few pictures he managed to take. “Enjoy those,” Mike tells him. “There won’t be any more.”

Ryan nods without taking his eyes off the phone. They fall into silence, Michael scratching Herman’s ears and flipping through TV channels during the commercials as Ryan checks his messages, replying to a few texts.

Eventually, Ryan crawls past the dogs to Mike’s end of the couch and works his mouth up the younger man’s collarbone, neck, jaw to his lips, pulling him in for a warm kiss. He murmurs a, “thank you” when he withdraws slightly to breathe.

“What for?” Michael replies quietly, absently carding a hand through Ryan’s hair.

“For...indulging me,” Ryan smiles.

Michael looks at him for a little while before replying. “No problem,” he says earnestly. “I enjoyed it too.”

Ryan looks surprised, “Which bit? Because every time I turned around you seemed grumpy as fuck.”

Michael blushes. “Sorry. It’s been a while for me, that’s all. But it was good seeing you happy. In your element, even. I haven’t seen that for a while.”

Ryan pushes himself up, sitting next to Michael and all of a sudden appearing to be serious. “You do know that I’m not, uh, fundamentally unhappy, right? Like, that lately, all of this...stuff, it’s just because I was bummed about...Ava.”

Mike joins Ryan in an upright position on the couch and takes his hand. “I...there was a point when I doubted that. When I thought you might be disappearing into a place I wouldn’t get you back from. But it’s ok, I understand. I always did. We just reacted differently, that’s all. I know you think it was your fault somehow, but I hope that someday you stop thinking that. Because it wasn’t. It’s shitty, but these things happen, ok?”

Ryan squeezes his hand and nods but looks away. Michael rubs his thumb across Ryan’s hand for a few moments before speaking again. “Has my three weeks started yet?”

Ryan looks up again and grins slowly. “If it had been up to me it would’ve started a few hours ago already,” he says. “Seriously hard work being decent for the cameras today when you were looking like that, Mike.”

“Hard?” Michael asks, waggling his eyebrows.

Ryan punches him playfully on the arm. “Stop fishing, start stripping,” he demands, pushing Michael back against the cushions.

*

They unanimously award Cullen with the “best reaction to the Christmas card” prize – it’s actually quite close, because Ryan’s nephews put up a good fight by doodling over their mother’s copy, but Ryan marks them down and makes a mental note to head round as soon as possible to give them some colour-coordination lessons. But his disappointment in his nephews is short lived – his phone rings and he answers Cullen’s call.

“Is that your failed audition for the Gap’s annual holiday cheese-fest commercial?” Cullen crows.

Ryan snorts. “Dude, no. I mean, like, they offered, because I’m hot and they’re into the gays and all, but there was no fucking way I was accepting that shit. Mike was actually pretty keen because, like, money, but I’ve got standards. We’re better than the Gap.”

Cullen rolls his eyes. “Anyone reminded you lately that you’re Ryan Lochte, not Ryan Gosling?” he asks.

“Lochte-Phelps,” Ryan immediately corrects him. “And as a matter of fact, yes: Mike did, when we were walking the dogs and apparently I look like I think life is a photoshoot. Being married to the dude is fucking difficult sometimes, he comes out with all kinds of shit.”

“And I’m sure being married to you is a walk in the park,” Cullen laughs.

“Of course it is! I’m awesome in bed, I tell him when he’s gone from sexy to paedophile in the facial hair department, I do all of our laundry and my mom’s a great cook. What’s not to love?”

“Well, when you put it like that...”

“Sorry bro, I’ve gotta go: Abercrombie are on the line, I’d better see if it’s my amazing abs or Mike’s skinny-ass retired ones they want,” he jokes, hanging up with a laugh.

The enlarged print of one of the outtakes from the shoot which they had framed catches Ryan’s eye. They normally agree to keep their private life, well, just that, but something in Ryan can’t resist sharing on this occasion.

He snaps a photo of the picture on his phone and uploads it to Twitter: “Eat your heart out, Kardashians; kiss my ass, Gap: happy holidays from the Lochte-Phelps pad #jeah”.


End file.
